Today is the start of our eighth Card Caravan Challenge, but before we get to that we’d like to say thank you to all of our participants of our seventh challenge! So many wonderful entries!

Before we announce this week’s challenge, I’d like to announce Sylvia’s Top three Favorite Peeps (in random order):
1. #18 Lovely Linda
2. #21 Carol
3. #37 Kristi S

Congratulations to you! Feel free to grab our badge for your blog.

Our next challenge is “two”. I was inspired to have this be our challenge as today is my mom and brother’s birthdays! You could interpret this to be a card for a second birthday, two buttons, two ribbons, two layers, or even two cards. The sky’s the limit! Here is some inspiration from our card caravan team:

Julie made some two amazing ornaments with The Cutting Files’ Artisan Labels Set 1 and Danielle Engelbretson’s Vision of Sugarplums .

Cathy created an adorable card with two penguins. She used lots of Pengiun Pal products from Paper Garden Projects: Penguin Pal Deck the Halls Digital Elements , Penguin Pals Tags and Borders Digital Elements , Penguin Pals Snow Flurry Papers , and Christmas Sentiments Digital Stamps by Arty Pants.

LuAnn took the “two” theme to an extreme and used 2 papers from Sarah Jone’s A Bushel and A Peck paper pack using 2 layers. She added 2 rows of double twine with 2 double bows and she used 2 different sentiments from Paper Smooches to create the sentiment.

I created two cards were made using Sugarplum Paperie’s beautiful Comfort and Joy .

Thanks for coming by and we can't wait "to" see your projects incorporating "two"!
Melissa and the Card Caravan team

Today is the start of our third Card Caravan Challenge, but before we get to that we’d like to say thank you to all of our participants of our second challenge! There were so many beautiful cards!

Sylvia’s Top three Favorite Peeps (in random order)
1. Sasha
2. Joy
3. Maria Matter

Congrats to you three! Feel free to grab our badge for your blog!

The next challenge is to make a card with the theme autumn in mind. Let your creativity lead you on this one! Here is some inspiration from our card caravan team:

From Julie using the boutique collab Season of Thankfulness:

A card from Cathy with Golden Harvest Collaboration by Mari Koegelenberg and Danielle Engebretson and The Cutting Files Artisan Labels Set 1:

Sylvia’s card using Russet Riches by Danielle Engebretson:

From Melissa with Autumn Walk by Etc. by Danyale:

Thanks for coming by and we can’t wait to see your autumn projects!
Melissa and the Card Caravan team

This project provides lots of options for personalization. I used Paper Garden Project’s digital kit “Owl Be There for School”, which has the perfect pallet for any teacher and has gorgeous designs.

Let’s get started!

Supplies:

• Owl Be There for School digital kit by Paper Garden Projects
• Wood Desktop Organizer
• Paint and brush
• Printer
• Cardstock
• Distress ink
• Sponge
• Scor-Tape

The first step in my project was to choose the papers from the kit and print them.

I chose a plain teal paper, the argyle and diagonal star print. I wanted two patterns that had varied sizes to create some balance in the design of the final product.

Once those papers were printed, I started to paint. I used an ivory acrylic paint that can be found at any craft store and painted with a foam brush. I mostly focused on painting the edges, as the middle portions will be covered with paper. I didn’t worry too much about perfection in this step.

Next, I laid the organizer onto the paper and traced to provide a template of sorts. The paper will be a mat – leaving an edge of the wood showing on each side. Make sure that you trace on the back side of the paper.

For the second side mat, instead of using the wood organizer to trace, I simply used my first side that was cut out to trace. I used my regular craft scissors for cutting. The straight lines could also be cut using a paper cutter if you are worried about getting perfectly straight lines.

Before adding adhesive to the back of the paper, I ran a bit of distress ink around all the edges of each piece to hide any cutting imperfections and to give it a bit of an aged look.

To adhere my paper, I used Scor-Tape, one of my favorite adhesives. I find that it works great on many mediums and does not budge. I made sure to put the tape into all the edges of each piece of paper. Other adhesives would work for this as well, such as Modge Podge. Just make sure you choose something that will hold up well to handling.

The final, and most fun step, is to choose what you’d like to add to your box. I put in two large post-it notes and a bunch of pens tied together with a ribbon. I also cut out a couple bookmarks using a die and the leftover digital paper. For those, I simply tied on some bakers twine on the top and left the pretty pattern as the main attraction. Also added were a few bookplates, also cut using a die and stamped.

I didn’t get a chance to photograph it just before giving it away, but I did also add some chocolates. (Those are essential for any teacher, right?!)

Thanks for taking a look at my project!

Today I’m sharing a project I made using a beautiful digital kit Flower Fashion Tea Party by Paper Garden Projects and a free mug template that I found online. This easy project is the perfect way to present a gift to any coffee-loving friend or family member!

Supplies:

• Flower Fashion Tea Party digital kit by Paper Garden Projects
• Cup of cocoa template from Clear and Simple Stamps
• cardstock for printing
• Photoshop Elements
• printer
• Adhesive
• ribbon
• scissors
• Dies (for cutting mat)
• Ink and Stamps
• Foam Tape
• Scoring Tool/Bone Folder

Here’s a look at the beautiful kit that I used for my project:

My first step was to open Photoshop Elements and print off my first full page of one digital paper (I chose a pretty pink design), onto double sided printer paper. Then, I turned the paper over to run back through my printer, this time printing a brown paper. I did the same thing a second time so that I would have enough digital paper to make the whole template and use on my card.

I went back to Photoshop and chose the mug image and several flowers to print onto a separate sheet. I will use this for the card and decoration on my mug.

I also printed off the template onto regular copy paper and laid it over my digital paper using temporary adhesive to keep it in place. Then, I cut and scored according to the lines on the template. The mug was adhered together using Scor-Tape and Zip Dry, a liquid adhesive. The mug got one circle on the bottom and one on the interior to give it a finished look.

The handle of the mug also was cut from the double-sided paper so that both patterns show through.

Since the mug was constructed using heavy-weight paper, it is pretty sturdy and can hold a substantial gift for my recipient. It can be decorated using any of the beautiful elements from the Tea Party kit. I chose these three pretty flowers.

The card reflects the same design elements as the mug – the pink digital paper paired with some cardstock mats cut with my dies.

The digital mug image comes already colored and makes putting this card together so easy!

I stamped the “Best Wishes” with brown ink, and tied a ribbon. The mug was adhered to the die cuts with foam tape to give it some dimension.

Now I have a great card and gift “box” on hand to give! I hope that you’ll take a look at the beautiful Flower Fashion Tea Party digital kit and that you may now have some ideas of things that you can create!

I have come up with some topics that we’ll be looking into and I gathered some books, atlases, map puzzles and other learning toys/tools, as well as planning some day trips, to keep the learning fun. We’ll be traveling, literally and figuratively, to learn about Mount Vernon in Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, and Washington DC. Each time we learn about and visit one of these places, we’ll jot them into their passports and then my kids will write up a postcard, drawing a picture about what they learned on the front, and then writing about it on the back. I will be helping my almost-four year old write.

Let’s see how I made the passports and postcards using these supplies…

• Around the World Collab kit – available at The Daily Digi on June 23rd before coming home to The Digichick in July
• Photoshop Elements
• Printer
• Cardstock and paper
• Zip Dry paper glue
• Stapler
• Score tool
• Clear Stamps and ink (Postmarks and Road Trip from Papertrey Ink)
• Zing! Embossing powder, Versamark and heat tool
• Distress ink and sponge
• Postage die to cut out stamps and die cutting machine

I first designed my passport cover and back cover using digital papers and images from the Around the World Collab kit in Photoshop Elements. I used a fun label as the place to type my title “passport” on the cover.

On the second page, I added the boarding pass image as a place to later write in, or have my son write in, their names and other info. The interior pages were designed using a ledger-style paper included in the kit.

At this same time, I created the postcards using a polka dot digital paper and two brushes included, one of which allowed for a space to write a several lines and the other as a perfect place to put an address. I love the vintage look of these brushes! The postcards measured about 5 x 7 inches, to give plenty of room for beginning writers to have space to write and draw.

After printing out all the pages, I started to put the passport together. The cover was cut to size and I inked the edges using a Distress ink and a sponge. At this point, I also scored that piece down the middle to create the cover and back cover. I also cut out the page 2 with the boarding pass tag, inked that as well, scored down the middle and adhered it to the cover using Zip Dry paper glue.

I then decided to add another decorative element to the cover so I heat embossed the wing image using gold Zing! embossing powder. I also stamped the compass image to the second page as well as Bon Voyage. Once I finished that, I cut down the remaining interior pages to size, scored them, and stapled them into the passport.

The third page contains the map image which was stamped onto Kraft cardstock, cut out and adhered. I was able to stamp the small star image to pinpoint a location on the map as well as stamping “I was here”. I’m sure my kids will enjoy finding all the place we will visit this summer on the map and stamping their mark as well!

For the postcards, I simply cut them out from the printed page, inked the edges and began to decorate with my stamps. I added the Post Card line with a dark brown ink. The little postage stamps were created using a die. I cut out several from cream and white cardstock, and stamped with the various images. I thought it would be fun to let my kids choose which stamps they want to add to their postcards.

And that’s how I created my summer passport! Thanks for taking a look at my passport and postcard project!

If I’ve inspired you to create your own passport, I’d love to see it so make sure you come back and link me to yours!

Today, I’ll be sharing how I made a wedding dress shaped card using a beautiful digital stamp and cardstock! The best part is that you can customize this card to any size and color you want, and it fits a variety of occasions: wedding shower, engagement or wedding.

Let’s gather our supplies!

Supplies:

• Flower Fashion Digital Stamp set by Paper Garden Projects
• Cardstock
• Printer
• Score tool
• Scissors
• Copic Markers
• Quickie Glue pen
• Glitter
• Sentiment stamp (Year of Flowers: Rose, Papertrey Ink)

The first step is to resize the dress digital stamp using Photoshop or Photoshop Elements.

I want my card to be fairly large, so I am going to print onto a 8 1/2 by 11 inch piece of cardstock. I made the image as large as I could while only using half of the cardstock. I centered the digital image on the right side of my blank 8 1/2 by 11 inch canvas.

Once the image is printed, you will want to score the cardstock to give it a nice, crisp edge. Since I was using heavier-weight cardstock, I didn’t need the edge to stay connected for one whole side, and was able to score just to the left of the veil. I had to turn my cardstock to an angle to make the score just along the veil portion, so it was not lined up against the top of my score board. Since the bottom of the dress is a fairly straight line, the angled score does not affect how the card will stand up.

Once you are finished scoring, it is time to cut out the card shape. I followed along the edges of the design roughly. Once the rough shape was cut out, I went back with some detail scissors to cut closer to certain parts and create more curves along the card edges.

After cutting, it’s time to color! I had fun coloring with my Copic markers, using pinks and purples, along with green for the leaves. Below is a photo of the markers that I used for this card for anyone who may be interested.

The final touch to the outside of the card was adding some glitter, adhering it with a Quickie glue pen. I put the glitter on the veil portion of the image to help differentiate between the dress and veil, and also to mimic the transparency of the veil.

I decided to make this a wedding card, so I stamped a sentiment on the inside of the card. I love that I have plenty of space to write my greeting.

Thanks for taking a look at my project! I hope you’ll check out Paper Garden Products gorgeous Floral Fashion digital stamps and create your own special card!

Starting today and running Monday through Friday of this week and next, we hope to inspire you with varied ideas for baby shower invitations, favors and decorations!

Check back often to see all the projects. And don’t forget that you can find past baby shower projects in the archives simply by using the search feature at the top of the page!

Today, I will be sharing some hybrid baby shower invitations. They are created using a digital invitation template, digital papers and some hybrid touches! Using the same digital collab kit, I made a more gender neutral invitation and one more geared to baby girls!

Here are the supplies I used:

• It’s a Party: Hybrid Invitation and Card Template by Geeky Diva Designs
• Wishes, Hopes and Dreams – A Digichick Boutique Collab kit
• Photoshop Elements
• Printer
• Cardstock
• Trimmer
• Buttons
• star punch
• Floss

To start, I opened the digital template in Photoshop Elements and started adding digital papers from the kit Wishes, Hopes and Dreams. For my first invitation, I took out some of the titles like “for” and “when” and decided to add some circle elements and labels in which to place my information. I also took out the floral elements. I added my text.

For the second invitation, I wanted to keep the same layout. I decided to use the same font as my first invitation, so again, I took out the subtitles and added them back in the same places with my own text. Then, I added several papers from the kit.

After printing, I trimmed both invitations down to size. For the purple invite, I adhered some aqua buttons onto the circle elements. Some of the buttons were threaded with floss, some I left without. The final step to finish this invitation was to mat it with cardstock to give it some weight.

For the second, more gender-neutral invite, I punched out some stars with a punch and adhered them with mini glue dots. I then matted the invitation with cardstock, and, finally, tied some twine around the top into a bow.

And there you have it, some quick and easy invitations that will set the tone of the baby shower!

I will show you a bit of how I colored these images using Copic markers. I am by no means an expert with Copics or even really that good, but you may find some of what I’ve learned useful! For my two cards, I chose to use the tulip and daffodil images – two lovely signs of spring.

Supplies used in these projects:

• Spring Blooms 2 digital stamp set by Paper Garden Projects
• Heavyweight cardstock (Papertrey Ink)
• Copic markers
• Printer
• Ribbons
• Nestabilities Label Die (Spellbinders)
• Asian Gardens stamp set (Waltzingmouse Stamps, used in background of Label)
• Birds of a Feather stamp set (Papertrey Ink, “with sympathy”)
• Versamark and purple ink
• Heat tool and clear detail embossing power

Let’s get started! I colored the bloom of the daffodil with my lightest yellow color all over, and then went back around certain parts with a darker yellow. You can see in the photo below how it looks before it has been blended.

These digital stamps are very easy to color in that the areas with darker shading are meant to be colored with a darker color. The more “black” the area of the digital stamp, the darker the color to use. I often color my images using three markers: lightest, middle and darkest of a color family.

The next photo shows the finished card with the yellows of the daffodil blended together. I am not the most patient when coloring, so I tend to go over the lines at times. This can be corrected by using the colorless blender, but sometimes a bit still hangs onto the cardstock as you can see. I also decided to outline the entire flower with a very light blue marker.

Next, I want to show how I color leaves. I chose three greens from a color family, and starting with the lightest, colored the entire leaf area. I then went back with the darkest green and colored the darkest areas of the stamp. This is what you see in the photo below.

The next step was to use the middle green marker and start to shade the darkest green into the lightest green. Then, using the lightest green marker, I shaded the middle green into the lightest.

After coloring my tulip blooms, I had a lot of marker over the lines that I was not able to correct with the colorless blender. I decided to cut out the image and mat it onto a die-cut label shape which was embossed with a stamped background image.

By popping up the tulips with some foam tape, I was able to bring dimension to the card.

Thanks for taking a look and I hope that you are inspired to check out these beautiful digital stamps!

To start, I opened Geeky Diva’s template with Photoshop Elements and chose which of the boxes to use. I clipped my papers onto the bottom and lid. I did reduce to opacity of the scoring lines so they would be less visible. Then, I printed both sheets. The next step is to cut out both pieces and score where needed. The template is very clear cut and I was able to quickly score. I like to use Scor-Tape on anything that will be handled as it does not budge! I added a bow to the lid.

I decided I wanted to include some little notecards, sized 3.75 inches by 3.75 inches, which fit perfectly inside the box. I simply opened a new document in my software added two papers onto that document and printed them off. I then cut three pieces out to add to the front of each card and adhered. I left them otherwise blank, so the recipient can use them however he or she likes.

My favorite part of this box is how roomy it is! I wanted to include a little bag of chocolates and since the doomed top gives lots of room, I was able to fill a bag and have it fit into the box without any squeezing!

I hope that my gift will bring a smile to the face of my friend and help her get through these last few weeks of winter!

Both the box template “That Little Box” by Geeky DIva and the digital kit “Jaunty, Olive and Orange” by Danielle Engelbretson will be available for sale on Thursday, February 17th in the Digichick shop.

• More Retro Valentines by Quirky Twerp
• printer and paper
• scissors
• cardstock
• glue
• glitter
• paper bag
• doilie
• stamp
• ribbon

After printing off the valentines, I cut them out using my detail scissors. I opted to cut along the straight edges rather than cut all the glitterly scallops out.

I then cut some cardstock to adhere to each of the images, scored them and adhered.

I thought it would be fun to add a part to the inside where the giver could write “to” and “from”. I used a stamp to do this, but it could easily be printed or even typed on the computer.

At this point, I went back to the front and added glitter to each using my glue pen.

Then, I packaged all four mini Valentines together in a kraft bag, which I cut off part of the top. I adhered a doily and tied a red ribbon around the whole thing.

The final step was to add one of the cute images to the front, attaching it with some foam tape to give it dimension.

Thanks for stopping by to see my project.